ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SCIENTIFIC REALISM AND SEMANTIC HOLISM
Keywords:
Scientific Realism. Semantic Holism. Scientific progress. Reference. Theoretical terms.Abstract
Semantic holism has been traditionally considered as a challenge for scientific realism. Stathis Psillos (2020), however, has put forward a novel point of view about the consequences of holism for realism: although he agrees that this semantic thesis brings about problems for realism, he claims that, in some way, it helps the realist agenda, since it prevents the elimination of theoretical terms. The aim of this paper is to analyze the compatibility of semantic holism and scientific realism, and to evaluate the aforementioned position of Psillos. I state that holism cannot be seen as favouring realism. On the one hand, I argue that holism is not compatible with the notions of progress and reference realism implies. On the other hand, I show that the consequence of holism that Psillos regards as benefitial for realism is not so and, in fact, can result in problems for some versions of realism.
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